And definitely use a much slower and clearer technique than on VHF.
Good advice! Also, consider using a higher pitch for your speech; it may carry better and improve audibility at the receiver’s end.
In ssb mode, pressing the ptt button alone does nothing. The idea is to put RF into the antenna tuner to force it to"tune up" for the frequency in use. Since there is no carrier in ssb mode, there is no RF output unless you add some audio modulation (traditionally you whistle into the mic) Or select AM, press the ptt button for a second or 2, then go back to ssb. Some radios have a "tune" button which does the same thing.
I never knew that! Very interesting.